9 ms·

I don't think that's right. It will be a major shift of power from Google/Facebook/Amazon to the ISPs. Comcast could charge Google or Facebook extortionate pric

by guelo 10y ago

I don't think that's right. It will be a major shift of power from Google/Facebook/Amazon to the ISPs. Comcast could charge Google or Facebook extortionate prices to keep their websites fast. Theoretically there would be nothing stopping Comcast from completely blocking a website. Cable vs TV channel negotiations periodically end up with blackouts for the channels.

bo1024 10y ago
Agreed. I don't think it would be good for consumers, but it wouldn't be very good for Google if every youtube video people watch buffers slowly and flickers, meanwhile $ISP has created a competing website that runs fine. Nor would it be good for Facebook if $ISP replaces all advertisements on their page with $ISP's own ads. (Hmm, I guess HTTPS should be able to prevent this?)
- jodrellblank 10y ago
  meanwhile $ISP has created a competing website that runs fine. It wouldn't be good for Google, but this seems as likely as an ISP beating SpaceX to the moon. It's hard enough to get an ISP to provide internet service most of the time.
  - nol13 10y ago
    Virgin Galactic ain't out yet.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
  - bo1024 10y ago
    Netflix is an easier example. I know that Comcast Xfinity, for example, already offers a bunch of video streaming on demand, and more if you buy their TV subscription in addition to internet. So they already have a partial competitor to Netflix and Hulu, with a big incentive to mess with connections to those companies so people will use theirs instead.
  - aplummer 10y ago
    Telstra in Australia invests a phenomenal amount of money into "Stan" / this.
dsr_ 10y ago
Google and Facebook now run networks larger than most major ISPs -- among the largest on the planet. Demand for Youtube and FB are so high and ubiquitous that pretty much any ISP will immediately cave in. Comcast is the most disliked company in the USA. Guess what happens when G runs a banner under each search or Youtube video mentioning that performance is bad because Comcast is blocking things, here's Brian Roberts's phone number?
- nemothekid 10y ago
  >Guess what happens when G runs a banner under each search or Youtube video mentioning that performance is bad because Comcast is blocking things, here's Brian Roberts's phone number? Nothing because consumers typically have a choice of 1 or maybe 2 ISPs? You said it yourself, Comcast is already the most disliked company in the US - they'd have nothing to lose by blocking YouTube - or worse, making it so slow that Google begins to lose viewership.
  - cmurf 10y ago
    Or default service that blocks VPN, tracks everything you're doing and uses it for their benefit; and if you don't like that you can pay extra to opt out. It's really clear. Democrats: This is the customer's information. Republicans: This is the ISP's equipment, and therefore anything on it is fair game for the equipment owner to use however they want, deny service to whoever they want, for any reason they want. So distilled down what you end up with is a classist system where privacy in infrastructure isn't a right, it's something you pay for: Rich people are better, they get more rights, because they can afford to buy those rights.
    - nocman 10y ago
      That's a pretty broad brush you are painting with. Do you have some hard data that says things break down so clearly along party lines? I'd particularly like to see data about non-politicians, if it is available, since the way Congress votes on such things is not necessarily driven by the way their constituents view the issue (if they are even aware of it).
confounded 10y ago
> Comcast could charge Google or Facebook extortionate prices They can pay. Start-ups, hobbyists, and non-profits can't.
- alpha_squared 10y ago
  They can, but should they?
  - ddalex 10y ago
    Yes.
    - komali2 10y ago
      Why?
- guelo 10y ago
  There's some price that they couldn't pay. Comcast would try to find what price that is.
  - OriginalPenguin 10y ago
    And once they found it, they'd charge exactly one cent less.
    - aero142 10y ago
      This whole chain is just parroting reddit comments without thinking it through. You act as though there is nothing that happens with market forces other that monopoly corruption. Let's start with the fact that by market cap, Google is 590B and Comcast is 177B, so simply buying ISPs is a real possibility. You also just out of hand dismiss any other possible outcomes. So, here some off the top of my head. * Local municipalities own the last mile, making ISP competition have less of a natural monopoly. * Cities add regulations that don't require universal coverage which results in more competition over profitable locations. Poor or underserved areas could be subsidized in other ways if that was the goal. * ISPs charges a toll to all the big companies, which makes installing lines more profitable, which increases competition and results in faster more available networks overall. Net neutrality might be the best option on the balance, but talking about the alternatives as though there isn't a whole wide world full of ISPs that have different regulatory structures and different incentives is just silly to me.
zrth 10y ago
Just for the sake of the thought experiment: Could not also Google/Facebook/Amazon charge one "misbehaving" ISPs Money for serving requests from their networks? (Sure, some customers would use alternative services, but who would be happy to use yahoo/myspace/ebay and the like. Yet some other of the ISP's customers would change the sip.)

by guelo 10y ago

bo1024 10y ago

Agreed. I don't think it would be good for consumers, but it wouldn't be very good for Google if every youtube video people watch buffers slowly and flickers, meanwhile $ISP has created a competing website that runs fine. Nor would it be good for Facebook if $ISP replaces all advertisements on their page with $ISP's own ads. (Hmm, I guess HTTPS should be able to prevent this?)

jodrellblank 10y ago
meanwhile $ISP has created a competing website that runs fine. It wouldn't be good for Google, but this seems as likely as an ISP beating SpaceX to the moon. It's hard enough to get an ISP to provide internet service most of the time.
- nol13 10y ago
  Virgin Galactic ain't out yet.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- bo1024 10y ago
  Netflix is an easier example. I know that Comcast Xfinity, for example, already offers a bunch of video streaming on demand, and more if you buy their TV subscription in addition to internet. So they already have a partial competitor to Netflix and Hulu, with a big incentive to mess with connections to those companies so people will use theirs instead.
- aplummer 10y ago
  Telstra in Australia invests a phenomenal amount of money into "Stan" / this.

dsr_ 10y ago

Google and Facebook now run networks larger than most major ISPs -- among the largest on the planet. Demand for Youtube and FB are so high and ubiquitous that pretty much any ISP will immediately cave in. Comcast is the most disliked company in the USA. Guess what happens when G runs a banner under each search or Youtube video mentioning that performance is bad because Comcast is blocking things, here's Brian Roberts's phone number?

nemothekid 10y ago
>Guess what happens when G runs a banner under each search or Youtube video mentioning that performance is bad because Comcast is blocking things, here's Brian Roberts's phone number? Nothing because consumers typically have a choice of 1 or maybe 2 ISPs? You said it yourself, Comcast is already the most disliked company in the US - they'd have nothing to lose by blocking YouTube - or worse, making it so slow that Google begins to lose viewership.
- cmurf 10y ago
  Or default service that blocks VPN, tracks everything you're doing and uses it for their benefit; and if you don't like that you can pay extra to opt out. It's really clear. Democrats: This is the customer's information. Republicans: This is the ISP's equipment, and therefore anything on it is fair game for the equipment owner to use however they want, deny service to whoever they want, for any reason they want. So distilled down what you end up with is a classist system where privacy in infrastructure isn't a right, it's something you pay for: Rich people are better, they get more rights, because they can afford to buy those rights.
  - nocman 10y ago
    That's a pretty broad brush you are painting with. Do you have some hard data that says things break down so clearly along party lines? I'd particularly like to see data about non-politicians, if it is available, since the way Congress votes on such things is not necessarily driven by the way their constituents view the issue (if they are even aware of it).

confounded 10y ago

> Comcast could charge Google or Facebook extortionate prices They can pay. Start-ups, hobbyists, and non-profits can't.

alpha_squared 10y ago
They can, but should they?
- ddalex 10y ago
  Yes.
  - komali2 10y ago
    Why?
guelo 10y ago
There's some price that they couldn't pay. Comcast would try to find what price that is.
- OriginalPenguin 10y ago
  And once they found it, they'd charge exactly one cent less.
  - aero142 10y ago
    This whole chain is just parroting reddit comments without thinking it through. You act as though there is nothing that happens with market forces other that monopoly corruption. Let's start with the fact that by market cap, Google is 590B and Comcast is 177B, so simply buying ISPs is a real possibility. You also just out of hand dismiss any other possible outcomes. So, here some off the top of my head. * Local municipalities own the last mile, making ISP competition have less of a natural monopoly. * Cities add regulations that don't require universal coverage which results in more competition over profitable locations. Poor or underserved areas could be subsidized in other ways if that was the goal. * ISPs charges a toll to all the big companies, which makes installing lines more profitable, which increases competition and results in faster more available networks overall. Net neutrality might be the best option on the balance, but talking about the alternatives as though there isn't a whole wide world full of ISPs that have different regulatory structures and different incentives is just silly to me.

zrth 10y ago

Just for the sake of the thought experiment: Could not also Google/Facebook/Amazon charge one "misbehaving" ISPs Money for serving requests from their networks? (Sure, some customers would use alternative services, but who would be happy to use yahoo/myspace/ebay and the like. Yet some other of the ISP's customers would change the sip.)